Thread by @robfordmancs

What's remarkable about this "banned list" - much cited by those claiming a free speech crisis - is how most of the events on the list either (a) do not involve a ban and/or (b) do not involve activities/decisions of unis or other academics:

afaf.org.uk/the-banned-lis…

This is why the detail matters - this list is cited in the Policy Exchange report now used by the govt as a "list of no-platforming and other academic controversies", with the claim it shows a rising trend of such instances. So it matters if many are nothing of the sort.

And many aren't:
Clark, Feb 2021 - not banned, and critics not academics or institutional
Phelps, Feb 2021 - not banned, cancelled due to a controversy not relating to fellow academics or the institution
Todd, Feb 2021 - not banned, and critics not academics or institutional

Loach, Feb 2021 - not banned, and critics not academics or institutional
Jan 2021 Essex debating society - event cancelled, but not clear why, not academics or institution responsible
Fox and Williams Jan 2021 - not banned, and criticism not from academics or the institution

Gasper, Jan 2021 - details of a contribution have vanished. Unclear why. Site editorialises claiming it is due to a twitter campaign (which is not academics or institutional)
Beck, Jan 2021 - expelled from a trade union, therefore not an academic or institutional matter

Stock, Jan 2021 - not banned, but other academics called for revocation of an OBE. So that does seem to fit the bill.
Sikorka, Jan 2021 - not banned, but "faced pressure from the press and social media". Not an academic or institutional matter then

Heneghan and Jefferson, Nov 2020 - faced criticism on Facebook(!). Goes without saying that British universities/academics don't set facebook's policies

Knowland, Nov 2020 "a schoolteacher, not an academic". Well, that's that one cleared up then.
Price, Oct 2020 - also not an academic (a porter), and also criticised by people who are not academics (student society). No evidence he lost his job

Levitt (Oct 2020) - invitation withdrawn following criticism of his COVID views from other conference participants. There is at least a case to consider with this one - academic, and academic event.

Williamson (Oct 2020) - former Lab MP Chris Williamson is not an academic. Event was not academic. Critics were not academics. Student society again.
Dawkins (Sept 2020) - an academic, and an academic event, but not in the UK (Trinity College, Dublin)

So of those first 15 incidents, covering the past 5 months, only 3 seem to fit even a broad definition of facing efforts to shut down or otherwise express strong hostility from other academics (one of which is in Ireland, not UK).

Most are instead student organisations criticising events, criticism which sometimes (though not always) call for speakers to be "no platformed". The events themselves are also mostly put on by student organisations.

Free speech within student societies etc is itself of course an issue worthy of attention. But it is misrepresentation to present this as academics being "banned from speaking at universities". Virtually none of these incidents meet that definition, even loosely.

There is also a fair amount of evidence that the organisation drawing up this list isn't exactly presenting things neutrally. There's plenty of language looking to gin-up the seriousness of minor incidents or editorialise on the alleged broader impliations.

For example, a bit later decisions (or even just proposals) to rename buildings is presented as "banning the dead".

Then there are cases where an academic said something controversial, some people got upset, and the uni defended them fully. Why are these included on a "banned list" is not explained. "Some people criticised what x said in public" is clearly not the same as "x was banned".

Why am I focusing on this rather obviously unsystematic, impressionistic and inconsistently list of events which mostly do not meet the claimed defintion. Well, because it is cited regularly, as is the organisation maintaining it, as evidence of a "free speech crisis" on campus

If major changes to university free speech policies are going to be made on the basis of reports citing evidence like this, that evidence should be scrutinised. And if it doesn't stand up to scrutiny, that's a problem. Clearly, it does not.

People being mean about an academic on twitter, the university defending them and then...nothing happening is not a "banning incident".

"The talk went ahead"
"Not banned, but"
A twitter group campaigned..."

These are not incidents of academic free speech being infringed!

As some people in my replies seem determined to miss the point here by so far that the point isn't even visible any more let me be clear: criticism of this *specific* list is *not* a claim that no problem of any kind exists and certainly not an endorsement of intolerant behaviour

It is instead simply the following claims:
1. This list presents itself as a catalog of academic "banning"/no platforming
2. It is being treated by prominent figures in the debate as robust evidence
3. It is not robust evidence.

That is all.